Alberta’s Wildrose party hosted a telephone town hall March 18 with official Opposition leader Danielle Smith and Chestermere-Rockyview MLA Bruce McAllister, to talk to supporters and the public about education curriculum reforms they believe are doing students a disservice.
“It’s a trend we see being forced onto Alberta students in both the public and the Catholic school systems,” Smith said. “It essentially boils down to this, that instead of focusing on mastering the basics through fact-based learning techniques, students are encouraged to invent their own strategies and methods of learning. The new curriculum is, understandably, causing parents concern.”
The provincial government is under fire for changes to educational curriculum that focuses on what is called discovery, or inquiry-based learning. Discovery-based methods for teaching math encourage students to invent their own strategies to solve problems, according to Alberta Education.
Albertans are concerned their children aren’t learning the fundamental skills to prepare them for higher education, Smith told participants listening in the town hall.
Listeners, like Jan from Calgary, didn’t understand why students were being taught this new discovery-learning.
“Years ago, kids were told it wasn’t important to know spelling and grammar, and as a consequence, most of our kids are illiterate,” she said. “Now they’re trying to do this with mathematics, they’re not going to teach them to add? And how to subtract? The basic bones of education are lacking nowadays and I don’t understand what the purpose is.”
McAllister said the purpose of the town hall was to start a conversation the Alberta government had to address.
“There’s a situation with curriculum that parents and teachers aren’t happy with, and (the provincial government) need to start listening to the people in the trenches and the people that matter,” he said.
Overall performance of Canadian students in all three subjects was better than the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) average. However, success in math for Alberta and Canadian students is declining.
The Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) is an international survey conducted every three years, to assess competencies of 15 year olds in reading, math and science. In 2012, approximately 510,000 students from 65 countries took part.
In 2012, Canadian students placed 13th in mathematics, down from 10th spot in 2009, according to PISA results. Scores in Alberta fell 32 points over nine years, when the province was once at the top of the PISA scoreboard.
There was a reason Alberta was No. 1 in this country in the PISA results at one time, McAllister said.
McAllister, who is also the Wildrose’s education critic, said mastering the basics never goes out of style.
“Throwing out the mastery and memorization of math is a big problem, and that seems to be what Alberta Education is pushing towards,” he said.
Dr. Nhung Tran-Davies, a family doctor and mother of three in Calmar, Alberta, started a petition earlier this year to change math curriculum for children in the province, after her eight-year-old daughter Kenya struggled with Grade 3 math. The petition had 11,615 signatures as of press time, with an additional 3,386 needed to reach a goal of 15,000.
“I think many people are aware of what we’re wanting with the petition, and that is for the government to improve the curriculum by re-emphasizing the importance of math fundamentals,” she said.
Tran-Davies said she’d like to see conventional math strategies taught first, and if a child has difficulties, to look at other problem solving strategies then.
“Not all children require or need to learn five strategies all at once, and they can’t be expected to know or choose from the five strategies which is their best personal strategy for solving a problem,” Tran-Davies said.
“That’s where teachers are important and play a role in guiding students.”
What the Wildrose is concerned about is that this new one-size-fits-all approach isn’t working for a lot of kids, Smith said during the town hall.
Alberta Education Minister Jeff Johnson was scheduled for an interview with the Rocky View Weekly on March 20, but was unavailable.
In a column Johnson submitted to the Rocky View Weekly (see page 9), he said he believes that inquiry-based learning is more responsive to the different ways in which students learn.
“I wish to assure parents that these basic skills will serve as the foundation and starting point of every change made to the curriculum,” he wrote. “What they won’t be is the end point.”
